Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller, 2015)

Spoilers!

Awesome, insane, kinetic, and damned loud. This is probably the most fun I’ve had in the cinema in ages. Miller takes the Mad Max concept (more Road Warrior than the original) and throws every technique he can at the screen – and it all sticks. The plot is paper thin but who cares when it runs you over with such effectiveness.

What little plot there is resembles a classic chase Western – Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) is attempting to escape the clutches of ugly heavy breather, Immortan Joe. She’s taking his brides with her, a set of vogue models who look a little out of place in the desert. Max (Tom Hardy) ends up helping out. And that’s it really. Cars chase trucks. Motorbikes chase trucks. People jump, scream, and get killed in various amusing ways. The soundtrack (part diegetic through Immortan’s peripatetic drummers and flame-throwing guitarist) booms at you, driving the film relentlessly forwards. It’s pure cinema – all movement.

Hardy, taking over from Mad Mel, is virtually silent. But it befits the role – he is action, a machine as much as any of the cars. Theron dazzles and owns much of the movie. Some internet trolls are sad about the strong women who fight a male society that exploits and brainwashes (including Nicholas Hoult’s excellent Nux), but I’m just happy to see interesting female characters in the film. Is there a feminist subtext? Sure. It says women shouldn’t be treated as objects, as Immortan’s breeding stock. It also suggests that when masculinity goes feral it’s not a great time to be alive. Looking at history I’m pretty comfortable with both those statements. What does surprise is that Miller got $150 million from Warner Bros. for the film. There are no concessions to PG-13 here. The film displays a wonderful aesthetic, lingering on obscene details (such as a milk farm, pumping the breasts of mothers) and twisted facial features. At times the landscapes are gorgeous, but often the people are damned ugly. All this, though, brings character and visual fascination to the piece. More surprising though, than the action, the feminism, or Miller’s uncompromising direction, are the clearly Marxist undertones. Immortan uses a religion (with the promise of Valhalla) to control the War Boys, his personal army. He controls the water and food (the literal means of production) and suppresses the poor in his Citadel through their supply. The movie ends with the War Boys’ religion revealed as the controlling myth it always was, and the water taps are turned on full for the poor. The elite of society, those who have perpetuated war, pollution and oppression, are dead.